Rabies risk is medically identified from eating dogs & cats

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 2009:

 

 

Rabies risk is medically identified from eating dogs & cats

 

 

HANOI--People who prepare dog and cat meat for human

consumption are at risk of contracting rabies, warned medical

researcher Heiman Wertheim, M.D. in the March 18, 2009 edition of

PLoS Medicine

PLoS Medicine is a peer-reviewed open-accesss online

scientific journal published by the Public Library of Science. With

offices in San Francisco and Cambridge, England, PLoS Medicine

" gives the highest priority to papers on the conditions and risk

factors that cause the greatest losses in years of healthy life

worldwide, " state the editors.

Wertheim and colleagues from the National Institute of

Infectious & Tropical Diseases and the National Institute of Hygiene

& Epidemiology in Hanoi, Vietnam, researched the association of dog

meat with rabies after encountering two cases.

The first patient " had prepared and eaten a dog who was

killed in a road accident; rabid dogs were known to inhabit the

neighborhood. The second patient butchered and ate a cat who had

been sick for a number of days, " e-mailed Wertheim to members of the

International Society for Infectious Diseases.

" It is thought that infection occurred during the

slaughtering [or butchering], and not by eating the meat, " Wertheim

continued, " as the meals were shared by others who did not become

infected.

Rabid dogs have been found in dog slaughterhouses, where

workers are vaccinated as part of the national rabies control

program, Wertheim explained, but people who kill dogs for personal

consumption usually are not vaccinated.

" Vietnamese doctors already consider dog slaughtering a risk

factor for rabies transmission, but it is important that other

health care workers and policy makers, both inside and outside

Vietnam, are aware of this risk factor, " Wertheim concluded.

Shamsudeen Fagbo of the Depart-ment of Tropical Veterinary

Diseases at the University of Pretoria in South Africa responded to

the Wertheim posting by suggesting that rabies is also contracted

through killing and butchering dogs and cats in parts of Africa.

" In Nigeria, " posted Fagbo to the scientifically refereed

ISID ProMed mailing list, " dog eating is very common in states such

as Plateau, Akwa Ibom, Cross River, Kaduna, Kebbi and Ondo. Cat

eating, though not as common as dog eating, can also be encountered,

even in cosmopolitan places such as Lagos. While human consumption

of bats is also common, " Fagbo added, " there seems to have been

little or no local effort (as per the limited information available)

to evaluate the risk of rabies transmission.

" Rabies is no doubt underreported and probably misdiagnosed

in Nigeria and elsewhere in Africa, " Fagbo continued. " Cultural and

religious beliefs will also contribute to the underreporting of

human rabies that may arise from the consumption of infected but

apparently healthy dogs and cats. The [rabies-related] Lagos bat and

Mokola lyssaviruses remain under-diagnosed in the human populace. "

Fagbo pointed out that a little-noticed paper entitled

" Rabies in apparently healthy dogs: histological and

immunohistochemical studies, " published in 2006 in The Nigerian

Postgraduate Medical Journal, identified dog-eating as a high-risk

practice in restaurants near two military barracks in Maiduguri, an

overwhelmingly Muslim city where eating dogs is otherwise culturally

forbidden. The researchers found evidence of rabies in the heads of

16 of 52 dogs who had been butchered. " If the observations [of

authors B.B. Ajayi, J.S. Rabo JS, and S.S. Baba] are confirmed, "

wrote Fagbo, " this, in their words, 'signifies a new dimension in

the epidemiology of the disease.' "

Also in 2006, rabies was linked to two human fatalities in

the Philippines.

" Ressia Mae Edoria, 4, of Barangay Molobolo, Cauayan,

Negros Occidental died last December of rabies and encephalitis,

days after neighbors gave her dog meat " at a drinking party, "

reported Margaux C. Ortiz of The Philippine Inquirer in Makati City

on February 1, 2006. " Renante Edoria, the girl's father, said his

daughter suffered from high fever and exhibited symptoms of rabies

shortly after eating the meat. "

Hospitalized on December 13, 2005, Ressie Edoria died a few

hours later. Animal Kingdom Foundation veterinarian Winston

Samaniego told Ortiz that the rabies virus may have attacked her as

rapidly as it did by entering her nervous system though a tooth

cavity.

" I am now appealing to everyone to stop eating dogs to avoid

this kind of tragedy, " said Renante Edoria.

In June 2006, the Philippines Sun Star reported, " One man

died and 23 others are under observation after eating rabid dogs in

Maasin, Iloilo. Rolando Carmelita, Jr. died after he cooked and ate

a rabid dog. He also fed the meal to his relatives. Not contented,

they cooked and ate two more rabid dogs. "

Added Greg Salido Quimpo of Animal Kingdom Foundation, " The

victim's mother is a village councilor. She passed a resolution

banning the eating of dogs. "

Malaysian Society of Parasitology & Tropical Medicine

president S. Vellayan, M.D. warned in July 2008 via Marjorie Chiew

of The Star of Malaysia that rabies is only one of the health hazards

of eating dogs, after politicians objecting to the presence of

street dogs suggested that the dog should be eaten.

" Eating stray dogs is not encouraged, " Vellayan said,

" because some of them may have viruses, bacteria and parasites and

can bring about parasitic problems such as cysts and tapeworm

infection. These can be transmitted from animals to humans if the

meat is not cooked thoroughly. People can also be infected with

tapeworms and rabies when slaughtering the infected animals with

their bare hands, " Vellayan cautioned.

Vellayan suggested that rabies might be more common in dogs

from northern and border states. He also cited risk of dog-eaters

contracting tuberculosis, salmonellosis and leptospirosis.

" Protozoan diseases such as toxoplasmosis can be transmitted via the

oral route to humans, " summarized Chiew. " In the congenital form,

transplacental infection can take place in the early months of a

woman's pregnancy, resulting in abortion or stillbirth. "

Increasing recognition of eating dogs and cats as a vector

for transmission of rabies may have the most significance in southern

China and parts of the Philippines.

Thousands of people per year die of rabies in China, almost

entirely in the regions where dogs are commonly eaten and raised for

meat. So-called " meat dogs " are not vaccinated, because of the

belief that vaccination would make them unfit for consumption.

 

 

 

--

Merritt Clifton

Editor, ANIMAL PEOPLE

P.O. Box 960

Clinton, WA 98236

 

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